Students participate in College Music Society concert online

Submitted by Scott Deal
Phone: (907) 474-7778
09/11/06

Members of the University of Alaska Fairbanks Telematic Ensemble will be performing from the Discovery Lab in a featured concert at the upcoming College Music Society National Conference in San Antonio, Texas, Wednesday, Sept.13, at 5 p.m. The evening conference will feature percussion majors Eric Retterer and Caitlyn Hatcher, along with six other percussionists located at the University of Florida, University of South Carolina, and in Texas.

The performance will demonstrate how the Internet is transforming artistic performance and expression. UAF percussion professor Scott Deal, director of the Telematic Ensemble will be on stage in San Antonio as one of the performers.

The performance is enabled by a new technology called the "netronome." The netronome acts as a metronome, a counting device that aids musicians in time keeping. Since there are obvious time delays over long distances, the netronome sends a synchronistic click to each musician and then coordinates all of the players as if they were all in the same room.

This performance is being conducted with the cooperation and assistance of the Arctic Region Supercomputing Center. The Telematic Ensemble is a group of student artists applying their skills to the new telematic medium, which refers to the use of the visual screens and the Internet as part of a performance.

Last year the ensemble performed globally in several events. The first was with the ART GRID consortium comprised of performers from seven universities in North America. That concert was performed before a live audience in Alaska and at the University of Utah. A second live concert occurred in Helsinki, Finland between UAF music students and the Helsinki Computer Orchestra, an ensemble comprised of computer music students at the Helsinki Music Institute.

Wednesday’s performance will be streamed in room 010 of the West Ridge Research Building. The streamed concert is open to the public and the university community, but seating is limited. For more information, contact Paul Mercer at 450-8649.